The Briefing 08-12-14

Podcast Transcript

1) Response to Robin Williams’s death reveals how closely Americans identify with entertainers

Robin Williams dies in apparent suicide; actor, comic was 63, Los Angeles Times (Ryan Parker, Steven Zeitchik, and Lauren Raab)

2) St Louis erupts in race conflict over death of teenager Michael Brown

Riot erupts near St. Louis over police shooting of teen, Chicago Tribune

3) Voting trends reveal fertility has everything to do with worldview

Big pro-life families are shifting the abortion debate, Boston Globe (Kevin Lewis)

Differential Fertility as a Determinant of Trends in Public Opinion about Abortion in the United States, (J. Alex Kevern and Jeremy Freese)

The Roe Effect, Wall Street Journal (James Taranto)

Tell Me a State’s Fertility Rate, and I’ll Tell You How It Voted, New York Magazine (Lauren Sandler)

4) China announcement warning of danger of Christianity being co-opted by political regime

China plans its own ‘Christian theology’, BBC News

China plans establishment of Christian theology, China Daily

China’s grim religious freedom problem, Washington Post (Katrina Lantos Swett And M. Zuhdi Jasser)

5) Controversial California textbook reminder that sexual revolutionaries are aiming at children

Textbook shelved after sex toy, bondage topics spark protest, Los Angeles Times (Veronica Rocha)